Nu's Student Government Penalizes Paper

Conservative Staffers Planning An Appeal

The staff of the Northwestern Chronicle will have to hold their staff meetings in the student lounge and head for a private shop to do their photocopying if student government sanctions meted out Tuesday night against the conservative paper are upheld.

Chronicle staffers were sanctioned for deliberately violating a section of a Student Senate rule that requires them to pick up all unwanted copies of their free weekly within 24 hours of delivery.

Their violation of another section, which bars them from delivering their free weekly to the doors of students who don't want it, was referred to the University Hearings and Appeals System Board.

"It is unfortunate when a student group cannot respect the wishes of the student body," Associated Student Government Executive Vice President Cara Henrickson said in a news release. "We hope the sanctions indicate our encouragement of a more productive and healthy relationship between students and student groups."

The unrepentant Chronicle staff prepared Wednesday to appeal to the university board, which last year struck down an attempt by two dormitory councils to bar unsolicited delivery of the paper.

"We contend that the (hearing) last year already settled the issue of restricting our door-to-door distribution rights," said Chronicle editor Ronald Witteles, who plans to continue leaving his paper outside students' doors.

The sanctions, in effect until winter 1997, could have been worse. The paper could have been "derecognized" or kicked out of its Norris Student Center office.

Instead, the student government's Executive Committee decided to ban the paper's staff from using the student government's computers and copying machine and to bar it from taking advantage of the free advertising space offered student groups in the "Here and Now" column in the Daily Northwestern.

Witteles said loss of the copying machine and the staff's ability to reserve meeting rooms will hurt because staff meetings in the newspaper office are forbidden.

Robert Schluter, the Chronicle's faculty adviser, defended door-to-door circulation as important to the Chronicle because $17,000 of its annual $22,000 budget comes from advertisers who he said are drawn by the personalized delivery.

The committee's action followed a hearing Sunday night at which the Chronicle staff came under fire for its combative attitude in flouting the Senate rules.

"We have before us a student group that is out of control," said Gregory Cordaro, the student senator who is leading the charge against the paper.

Chronicle staffers, who claim they keep their conservative opinions to the editorial page, say they have to distribute door-to-door because the paper's critics have sabotaged attempts at leaving stacked copies in dormitory lobbies.